Hon Chairperson, Ministers present, hon members and our guests, education remains without any shadow of doubt the most useful tool available that we can use to unleash human potential. It is the only tool we can rely on as a nation to achieve long-term success and prosperity.
Often there are huge discrepancies between what gets delivered to the people on the ground and these grand plans. Every year we congregate here to approve large amounts of money that are allocated for education without addressing the underlying causes of the complete state of paralysis that we see in our education system.
Allow me, hon Chairperson, to highlight some of the UDM's major concerns, which we believe are factors leading to overall poor education.
Firstly, according to the Basic Education Department's Action Plan 2014 of October 2010, there were approximately 400 mud schools in the country. There were also about 700 schools that had no toilets or water. In some provinces school nutritional programmes are run haphazardly.
While we appreciate the bold steps that are being taken to address these infrastructure backlogs through the Accelerated Schools Infrastructure Delivery Initiative in an effort to bring these schools to basic safety functionality, we are concerned about the fact that at the beginning of each year learning materials and crucial learning resources are not delivered to schools on time.
Secondly, unless we take bold steps to address these challenges, we shall continue to spend large amounts of money on a dichotomous education system, with quality being the prerogative of the haves and have-lots. We would be throwing money at the problem instead of addressing the root causes of the problem.
Government officials who fail to ensure that school materials reach schools on time should be sanctioned appropriately, otherwise we shall have to contend with such poor leadership every single year.
Thirdly, learners' and teachers' ill-discipline across the country is at an all-time high. The shocking levels of teachers' ill-discipline, in particular, can be addressed by the reintroduction of school inspectors. By doing so, the Department of Basic Education would enable itself to hold teachers accountable for their performance agreements. Strict adherence to and enforcement of the learner code of conduct would go a long way towards reducing the high level of learners' ill-discipline.
In conclusion, allow me to express our concern about the gap between good matric results and the same students failing dismally at institutions of higher learning. This trend is an indication of an underlying weakness in this school system. We are doing the nation a disservice when we allow learners who achieve code 2 to progress to the next level of education. We must ensure that our children leave matric with genuine results and knowledge to enter the job market or continue their studies.
The UDM will support this budget. I thank you. [Applause.]